Database - Study tips

Alternate different topics or types of questions while learning. This variation forces you to actively use your brain to think: if you keep answering the same type of questions about something, you will eventually work on autopilot and no longer need to think (and thus you do not learn). Test yourself by answering different types of practice questions about the learning material or by writing down the definitions of concepts from different chapters from memory. Make sure you first understand all the learning material you are going to learn. It is also important that it is about the same topic: for example, do not study different subjects at the same time. This way of learning will feel more difficult, and therefore less enjoyable, than just studying the same thing for a longer period, but it means that your brain has to work and that is learning. By repeating this over and over, spread over more time (see spread your learning moments), the learning material will stick better.

Active repetition

Rohrer, D. (2012). Interleaving helps students distinguish among similar concepts. Educational Psychology Review, 24, 355-367.

The Cornell method is an effective way of taking notes, remembering, and learning. Below is how it works.  Divide the page on which you are going to write (you remember better than typing) into 3 parts: a narrow vertical column on the left, a wide vertical column on the right, and a horizontal section at the bottom of the page: • In the right column, your detailed notes will be written. • In the left column, the most important keywords will be written. • In the section at the bottom, a summary of a few sentences will be written. Summarize the page in a few sentences. Take notes in the right column during the lesson. Use short sentences, keywords, bullet points, arrows to connect things, and make it visual by using pictures and icons. Keep it simple and immediately summarize what is being said. Use a new page for each new topic, this keeps it organized. Write keywords in the left column at the end of the lesson – or afterwards. Think of names, places, dates, key words, etc. You can also turn these into questions, so you can learn them later. Then write a short summary at the bottom of the page: what would you tell someone to make this topic clear? Now you can place a sheet over the right section and quiz yourself: explain terms or concepts from the left column and then check with what is on the right to see if it matches.

Actively processing

Peters, J. (2020, 7 januari). De Cornell methode om aantekeningen te maken. Geraadpleegd van: https://www.planning-en-agenda.nl/de-cornell-methode-om-aantekeningen-te-maken/

Akintunde, O. O. (2013). Effects of Cornell, verbatim and outline note-taking strategies on students’ retrieval of lecture information in Nigeria. Journal of Education and Practice, 4(25), 67-73.

Alzu’bi, M. A. (2019). The Influence of Suggested Cornell Note-taking Method on Improving Writing Composition Skills of Jordanian EFL Learners. Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 10(4), 863-871.

Donohoo, J. (2010). Learning how to learn: Cornell notes as an example. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 54(3), 224-227.

Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K.A., Marsh, E.J., Nathan, M.J., Willingham D.T (2013). Improving students’ learning with effective learning techniques: Promising directions from cognitive and educational psychology. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14, pp. 4– 58 https://doi.org/10.1177/1529100612453266

Use pictures or icons in your schedule or summary. This way you remember it better. By using images and words, you often remember information better. In this way, you have two ways to store and recall the learning material. Our brains often remember images better than words. So, for example, add (self-made) icons to a schedule or summary. It also helps to watch videos about the lesson material. Search for the topic on YouTube. Perhaps another teacher has made a video about it. You can then use this to better understand the topic. Finally, it also works well to try to 'visualize' the learning material (imagine it).

Giving instruction

Peeters, W. (2020, 7 januari). Dual Coding: Codeer leerstof dubbel in je brein. Geraadpleegd van: https://www.vernieuwenderwijs.nl/dual-coding-codeer-leerstof-dubbel-in-je-brein/

Clark, J. M., & Paivio, A. (1991). Dual coding theory and education. Educational psychology review, 3(3), 149-210.

Meijs, C., Hurks, P. P., Wassenberg, R., Feron, F. J., & Jolles, J. (2016). Inter-individual differences in how presentation modality affects verbal learning performance in children aged 5 to 16. Child neuropsychology, 22(7), 818-836.

Sadoski, M., Kealy, W. A., Goetz, E. T., & Paivio, A. (1997). Concreteness and imagery effects in the written composition of definitions. Journal of Educational Psychology, 89(3), 518.

Collaboration is educational, but also challenging. Here are some tips. Collaboration is often used to work together on a large project that you couldn't do alone. This is because the assignment is often too large for one person. For group work, it is important that all members of the group work together towards one common goal. It is important to focus on the following points: • Use each other's talents Everyone has their own talents. Make use of them. Divide the tasks in advance and take into account everyone's preferences and qualities. You can also use it to learn from each other. So see it as a challenge to do something with the help of a fellow student that you are not yet very good at. • Emphasize collaboration within the group Realize that criticism of each other's ideas is possible, but a personal attack is not. So when a piece doesn't seem right, give feedback on the piece and not the person. It should also be clear that making mistakes and receiving negative feedback are part of a learning process. Collaborating is not always easy, for example, how do you ensure that everyone does an equal amount? Make it effective with a canvas for the final product. You can record agreements on this. Start the collaboration by filling in the canvas. You can download a standard canvas https://www.vernieuwenderwijs.nl/wp-content/uploads/Basisbladv2a.pdf (see image).

Learning together

Nokes-Malach, T., Zepeda, C., Richey, J., & Gadgil, S. (2019). Collaborative learning: The benefits and costs. In J. Dunlosky & K. Rawson Zepeda, C., Richey, J., (Eds.), The Cambridge Hand- & Gadgil, S. book of Cognition and Education (Cambridge Handbooks in Psychology, pp. 500-527). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Surma, T., Vanhoyweghen, K., Sluijsmans, D., Camp, G., Muijs, D., en Kirschner, P. (2018). Wijze lessen: Twaalf bouwstenen voor effectieve didactiek. Meppel, Nederland: Ten Brink Uitgevers.

Set yourself a clear goal when you start learning. This way you can learn better. By setting a goal, it is easier to maintain your concentration. This works especially well if you work towards an end goal through smaller goals. This way, you can see how far you are with learning, which helps keep you motivated. Ensure clear and achievable goals. Suppose you need to learn 200 words for English. Then set the goal to learn 25 words each day and do this for 8 days (x 25 = 200). This ensures that you do your best to achieve the goal and therefore often do more than, for example, '30 minutes of vocabulary learning'.

Lucassen, M. (2020, 7 januari). Marzano en Hattie: de overeenkomsten uit meta-onderzoek. Geraadpleegd van: https://www.vernieuwenderwijs.nl/marzano-en-hattie-overeenkomsten-meta-onderzoek/

Lazowski, R. A., & Hulleman, C. S. (2016). Motivation interventions in education: A meta-analytic review. Review of Educational research, 86(2), 602-640.

Latham, G. P., & Locke, E. A. (2007). New developments in and directions for goal-setting research. European Psychologist, 12(4), 290-300.

Latham, G. P., Seijts, G., & Crim, D. (2008). The effects of learning goal difficulty level and cognitive ability on performance. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science/Revue canadienne des sciences du comportement, 40(4), 220.

Locke, E. A., & Latham, G. P. (2015). Breaking the rules: a historical overview of goal-setting theory. In Advances in motivation science (Vol. 2, pp. 99-126). Elsevier.

Drink enough so that you become calmer and can concentrate well. It is recommended to drink 2 liters per day. You can best do this by drinking water. Water has the added benefit of helping against nerves and with a hydrated body, you can think more easily. Drinking water can also have a psychological effect on cognitive functions and can help improve scores. Moreover, it can alleviate anxieties, and anxieties can have a negative effect on school performance. Why water has a positive influence on all this is not entirely clear, but it remains a fact that various studies show that it works positively. In addition to drinking well, it is also important to eat healthy and varied.

https://www.studenten.net/artikel/een-hoger-tentamencijfer-door-water-te-drinken

https://www.sevendays.nl/lifestyle-school/7-wetenschappelijke-leertips-voor-je-toetsweek

By chewing gum, you can concentrate longer. When you chew gum, extra blood flows to your head to help your jaws with that effort. This extra blood also goes partly to your brain, which helps your brain work better. Therefore, by chewing gum, you can concentrate better. It's not necessarily about chewing gum: you can chew on something else too.

https://willemwever.kro-ncrv.nl/vraag_antwoord/het-menselijk-lichaam/hoe-komt-het-dat-je-van-kauwgom-beter-kan-concentreren

https://www.nu.nl/gezondheid/3365477/langer-concentreren-kauwgom-kauwen.html

https://www.metronieuws.nl/nieuws/binnenland/2016/04/feiten-en-fabels-over-het-leed-dat-leren-heet

Use specific examples to understand abstract (complex) things. Collect the examples your teacher uses in class, and find as many concrete examples of your own as possible (in your learning material). Make connections between the concept you are learning/studying and those examples: then you will understand how the example fits with what you are learning. In this way, something abstract (vague) becomes clear (concrete).

http://www.learningscientists.org/

By making schemas, you can present information in an organized manner, which helps you understand how it is connected and remember it better.  A well-known example is a 'concept map': a schema where you indicate the relationships between different concepts or topics using lines. All blocks can be connected to each other. For example, you can connect all the important concepts from a chapter by asking the question: “What is related to what?” In the schema, you can also use colors and icons to make everything even clearer. Visualizing (schematizing) what you learn helps to remember things better, see connections more clearly, pay attention to sequence, and analyze new content. You can also use other types of schemas (see image next to this). Think, for example, of: • Drawing differences between things • Displaying different steps of something • Drawing a cycle

Grip on learning, deep learning

Geurts, R., & Wevers, I. (2020, 7 januari). Laat studenten een conceptmap maken. Geraadpleegd van: https://www.vernieuwenderwijs.nl/laat-studenten-een-concept-map-maken/

Batdi, V. 2014. “The Effect Of Using The Concept-Mapping Technique And Traditional Methods On The Achievement, Retention And Attitudes of students: A Meta-Analytic Study”, Dumlupinar University Journal of Social Sciences, no.42, pp. 93-102

Chiou, C. 2008. “The Effect Of Concept Mapping On students’ Learning Achievements And Interests”, Innovations in Education and Teaching International, vol. 45, no.4, pp. 375–387

Correia, P. R. M. (2012). The use of concept maps for knowledge management: from classrooms to research labs. Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry, 402(6), 1979-1986.

Read a text aloud, so you remember it better. When you read a text aloud, it is stored more strongly in your memory than when you read it silently. This helps you remember the information better. Ask one of your parents or a classmate if you can read a piece of text to them or give a kind of presentation to yourself in your room.

Fawcett, J. M., Quinlan, C. K., & Taylor, T. L. (2012). Interplay of the production and picture superiority effects: A signal detection analysis. Memory, 20(7), 655-666. https://doi.org/10.1080/09658211.2012.693510

Forrin, N. D., & MacLeod, C. M. (2018). This time it’s personal: the memory benefit of hearing oneself. Memory, 26(4), 574-579. https://doi.org/10.1080/09658211.2017.1383434

MacLeod, C. M. (2010). When learning met memory. Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology/Revue canadienne de psychologie expérimentale, 64(4), 227. doi: 10.1037/a0021699

Ozubko, J. D., & MacLeod, C. M. (2010). The production effect in memory: Evidence that distinctiveness underlies the benefit. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 36(6), 1543.

Highlighting text is often not an effective way to learn. Highlighting (marking, underlining) important words or sentences often doesn't work. This way, you often focus too much on individual facts and miss the bigger picture. Additionally, you can lose the overview. It can work: use highlighting to bring structure to the text. For example, use pink for the concepts of the text and yellow for the details. Also, be critical of how much text you highlight. Read the text through once before you start highlighting. This way, you better understand what is important information and what is not. What works even better is to write down from memory what you remember after some time (and then look up what you don't remember), answer questions about the text, or create a diagram of the learning material. That way, you learn even more actively.

Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D. T. (2013). Improving students’ learning with effective learning techniques: Promising directions from cognitive and educational psychology. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4-58.

Kostons, A. S. Donker & M.-C. Opdenakker. (2014). Zelfgestuurd leren in de onderwijspraktijk. Een kennisbasis voor effectieve strategie-instructie. GION onderwijs/onderzoek, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen.

Miyatsu, T., Nguyen, K., & McDaniel, M. A. (2018). Five popular study strategies: their pitfalls and optimal implementations. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 13(3), 390-407.

Yue, C. L., Storm, B. C., Kornell, N., & Bjork, E. L. (2015). Highlighting and its relation to distributed study and students’ metacognitive beliefs. Educational Psychology Review, 27(1), 69-78.

Spread your learning sessions over time, repeat regularly. By continuously training your brain to retrieve information from your long-term memory, you strengthen the connections between the neurons in your brain, making it easier to retrieve information from your long-term memory (see forgetting curve). You can do this by, for example, creating practice questions (test questions, quiz questions) from the learning material of the past weeks (see retrieval practice). By alternating topics and types of practice questions about them (see interleaving), the learning material will stick even better. It also makes little sense to study for long periods at a time: your memory can only handle a limited amount of information in a row. If you try to learn more than that, things will also be forgotten again. It is comparable to the storage of your phone that gets full and where space needs to be made (see Cognitive Load Theory). Additionally, you quickly forget new information again. By regularly learning and repeating in short sessions, spread over several days, you forget the learning material less quickly. To do this well, it is important to make a clear plan: plan your learning and, if necessary, ask for help from your teacher or parents.

Active repetition

Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D. T. (2013). Improving students’ learning with effective learning techniques: Promising directions from cognitive and educational psychology.  Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4-58.

Roediger, H. L., & Pyc, M. A. (2012). Inexpensive techniques to improve education: Applying cognitive psychology to enhance educational practice. Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, 1(4), 242-248.

Benjamin, A. S., & Tullis, J. (2010). What makes distributed practice effective? Cognitive Psychology, 61, 228-247.

Writing a summary is a handy way to learn something. Below is a step-by-step guide on how to write a summary. 1. Read the text thoroughly once. Pay attention to the titles, headings, and (if any) images. 2. If there are headings, determine the main point for each heading. The headings represent the different parts of a text. Pay attention to the bold, underlined, and italicized words in a text. If there are different paragraphs, you need to determine the important information for each paragraph. Often, the most important information is in the first and/or last sentence of a paragraph. 3. Write down in your own words what you have read for each heading. Think about the key words and phrases you looked up in step 2. Tell yourself why something is important. This way, you know if you understand the material well. Note: Use short sentences/keywords. 4. Consider the coherence between the headings. This way, the text becomes a logical story. 5. At the end, check if you have included all the important information. You can do this by reading the original text again. Tip: Create a short summary: This way, you really capture the essence and can easily review it later.

Dunlosky, J. Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J. Nathan, M. J. & Willingham. D. T. (2013). Improving students’ learning with effective learning techniques: Promising directions from cognitive and educational psychology. Psychology Science Public Interest, 14(1), 4-58. doi:10.1177/1529100612453266

https://www.malthastudiecoaching.nl/blog-onderwijs/2016/03/24/hoe-maak-je-een-goede-samenvatting/

By actively engaging with the learning material, your brain has to work. That is learning. You can actively engage with learning material in various ways. For example, you can create a schedule of the learning material or test yourself by answering questions. Additionally, you can actively work with the information you have already learned by trying to write down from memory what you still know. This works much better than reading a text a few times or highlighting the text. This often doesn't work well because it is passive (not active): your brain doesn't do much, so you remember little.

Active learning, active repetition

Dewing, J. (2010). Moments of movement: Active learning and practice development. Nurse Education in Practice, 10(1), 22-26.

Roediger, H. L., Putnam, A. L., & Smith, M. A. (2011). Ten benefits of testing and their applications to educational practice. Psychology of learning and motivation, 55, 1-36.

You read digital text faster, but when you have to read a long text, you understand it better when you read it on paper. Additionally, digital text helps you remember details better, while reading on paper leads to a better overall understanding. You quickly view small pieces of text online instead of one whole, which makes the coherence between the pieces of text less visible and therefore also less understandable. So, it is a good idea to read or print long texts (consisting of multiple pages) in your book. If the piece you need to read is not that long, you can choose where your preference lies. Remember that when you print a text, you can more easily mark sections. Additionally, you are less distracted with the printed version than the digital version because you are not tempted to look up other things on your computer.

Delgado, P., Vargas, C., Ackerman, R., & Salmerón, L. (2018). Don’t throw away your printed books: A meta-analysis on the effects of reading media on reading comprehension. Educational Research Review, 25, 23-38.

Kaufman, G., & Flanagan, M. (2016, May). High-low split: Divergent cognitive construal levels triggered by digital and non-digital platforms. In Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 2773-2777). ACM.

Kong, Y., Seo, Y. S., & Zhai, L. (2018). Comparison of reading performance on screen and on paper: A meta-analysis. Computers & Education, 123, 138-149.

Mangen, A., Walgermo, B. R., & Brønnick, K. (2013). Reading linear texts on paper versus computer screen: Effects on reading comprehension. International journal of educational research, 58, 61-68.

Margolin, S. J., Driscoll, C., Toland, M. J., & Kegler, J. L. (2013). E‐readers, computer screens, or paper: Does reading comprehension change across media platforms?. Applied cognitive psychology, 27(4), 512-519.

If you want to have your full concentration while studying, it is better to study in silence. Listening to music can cause you to be (unconsciously) distracted from your study work. Listening to loud, busy music or music with lyrics is worse than listening to quiet, calm music without lyrics. If you want to concentrate as well as possible, it is best to sit in a quiet room or isolate yourself with earplugs or headphones. If you are in a room with many distracting noises, listening to music can still help. By softly listening to calm music, you can create a peaceful learning environment for yourself. Additionally, music has a positive effect on your mood. So, it can be beneficial to listen to music while studying. If you do listen to music, it is especially wise to choose music without lyrics. Your brain automatically processes texts, which can be very distracting if you are also trying to read text. Your brain cannot https://leer.tips/tip/je-kan-niet-multitasken/. Therefore, it is important that you know the music: otherwise, your brain will learn the new music, which can actually cause distraction. Loud music almost always makes it harder for you to remember things.

Christodoulou, D. (2017). Making Good Progress, Oxford: OUP

Ensure a good place to learn. To learn as effectively as possible, it is important to have a good study space. A good study space has as much natural light as possible, is tidy, and not too warm. This way, you have the least distractions and can better focus on the learning material. Optionally, use earplugs, a website blocker, and keep your phone far away or set it to airplane mode. This way, you have even less chance of being distracted. For some people, it helps to have music on while learning. They can then concentrate better. Other people get very distracted by music. If you listen to music, it is especially smart to listen to familiar music without lyrics. To know if music helps you while learning, you can try it out. For example, play soft background music via YouTube and see if this is beneficial for the learning process.

Choi, H.-H., van Merriënboer, J. J. G., & Paas, F. (2014). Effects of the Physical Environment on Cognitive Load and Learning: Towards a New Model of Cognitive Load. Educational Psychology Review, 26(2), 225–244. doi:10.1007/s10648-014-9262-6

Higgins, S., Hall, E., Wall, K., Woolner, P., & McCaughey, C. (2005). The impact of school environments: A literature review. London: Design Council.

Klatte, M., Bergström, K., & Lachmann, T. (2013). Does noise affect learning? A short review on noise effects on cognitive performance in children. Frontiers in Psychology, 4, 578.

Tanner, C. K. (2008). Explaining relationships among student outcomes and the school’s physical environment. Journal of advanced academics, 19(3), 444-471

Vohs, K. D., Redden, J. P., & Rahinel, R. (2013). Physical order produces healthy choices, generosity, and conventionality, whereas disorder produces creativity. Psychological Science, 24(9), 1860-1867.

Your working memory quickly forgets newly learned things: you start to forget something new almost immediately, especially in the first 20 minutes. After a few days, you hardly forget anything (of the newly learned material). How quickly you forget something depends on how complicated it is, how tired you are when you learn it, and how important it is to you. How quickly people generally forget something can be seen in the Forgetting Curve of Hermann Ebbinghaus (see image). According to Ebbinghaus, it helps to regularly repeat (you forget it less quickly then), use pictures, and read aloud (you remember it better).

Active repetition

Carpenter, S. K., Pashler, H., Wixted, J. T., & Vul, E. (2008). The effects of tests on learning and forgetting. Memory & Cognition, 36(2), 438-448.

Roediger, H. L., Putnam, A. L., & Smith, M. A. (2011). Ten benefits of testing and their applications to educational practice. In J. Mestre & B. Ross (Eds.), Psychology of learning and motivation: Cognition in education, (pp. 1-36). Oxford: Elsevier.

Agarwal, P. K., Karpicke, J. D., Kang, S. H., Roediger III, H. L., & McDermott, K. B. (2008). Examining the testing effect with open‐and closed‐book tests. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 22, 861-876.

Butler, A. C. (2010). Repeated testing produces superior transfer of learning relative to repeated studying. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 36(5), 1118.

Test yourself in different ways to see what you know by heart.  By actively retrieving information from your long-term memory, you strengthen the connection between the neurons in your brain, making it easier to retrieve information from your long-term memory (see forgetting curve). Ways to do this include: • Answering practice questions (test questions, quiz questions) • After you have read or heard something, write it down without any aid • Use flashcards: cards where you write a question on one side and the answer to the question on the other side. This way you can immediately check if you got the answer right. By repeating this, spread over more and more time (see spread your learning moments), the learning material will stick better. By answering different types of practice questions about the learning material (see alternate topics), you will also master the material better. Reading a text again is not testing yourself: because you recognize things when rereading the text, you feel like you understand the material better. In reality, it's purely about recognition and it hardly contributes to remembering it: there's a good chance you won't be able to write it down from memory any better. You're actually fooling yourself (see Illusion of Fluency).

Active repetition

Carpenter, S. K., Pashler, H., Wixted, J. T., & Vul, E. (2008). The effects of tests on learning and forgetting. Memory & Cognition, 36(2), 438-448.

Roediger, H. L., Putnam, A. L., & Smith, M. A. (2011). Ten benefits of testing and their applications to educational practice. In J. Mestre & B. Ross (Eds.), Psychology of learning and motivation: Cognition in education, (pp. 1-36). Oxford: Elsevier.

Agarwal, P. K., Karpicke, J. D., Kang, S. H., Roediger III, H. L., & McDermott, K. B. (2008). Examining the testing effect with open‐and closed‐book tests. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 22, 861-876.

Butler, A. C. (2010). Repeated testing produces superior transfer of learning relative to repeated studying. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 36(5), 1118.

By writing, you generally remember things better than by typing. Although typing is faster, the slower pace of writing and the fact that you are physically (motorically) engaged with your hands means that you are more consciously involved, activating your brain more. You have to think more, and therefore you remember it better. For example, use the Cornell method. The study showed that students who took notes by hand remembered more of the lesson in a test taken half an hour later and also scored higher on comprehension questions about the learning material.

Bui, D. C., Myerson, J., & Hale, S. (2013). Note-taking with computers: Exploring alternative strategies for improved recall. Journal of Educational Psychology, 105(2), 299

Hembrooke, H., & Gay, G. (2003). The laptop and the lecture: The effects of multitasking in learning environments. Journal of Computing in Higher Education, 15(1), 46–64.

Luo, L., Kiewra, K. A., Flanigan, A. E., & Peteranetz, M. S. (2018). Laptop versus longhand note taking: Effects on lecture notes and achievement. Instructional Science, 46(6), 947-971.

Morehead, K., Dunlosky, J., & Rawson, K. A. (2019). How much mightier is the pen than the keyboard for note-taking? A replication and extension of mueller and oppenheimer (2014). Educational Psychology Review, 1-28.

Make a connection between new information and things you already know. For example, try to think of where you have seen or heard something before. Think of something familiar that it resembles. That way, you visualize it and understand the information better. Because you actively create an image of the information, you also store it better in your long-term memory. It helps to ask yourself questions: how do things work, how are things put together, and why do they work that way? Then look for the answers in your study material and discuss the answers with your classmates. As you process the study material, you make connections between different ideas. You can then explain how they are connected and interact with each other.

Brown, P. C., Roediger III, H. L., & McDaniel, M. A. (2014). Make It Stick. The Science of Successful Learning. The Journal of Educational Research, 108(4), 346.

http://www.learningscientists.org/

You cannot multitask, it just seems that way. Although it sometimes seems like you can do multiple things at once (for example, learning and occasionally texting), your brain is actually constantly switching tasks. Moreover, it takes quite a while to fully focus on one task again: if you stop learning for a few seconds to send a message, it takes an average of 2-3 minutes to fully concentrate again. So make sure to fully concentrate on your homework or study work while learning. Try to make your study area as distraction-free as possible: put your phone away and ensure you are in a quiet environment. Do you find it harder to keep your concentration on the task? Then take a short active break.

Bowman, L. L., Levine, L. E., Waite, B. M., & Gendron, M. (2010). Can students really multitask? An experimental study of instant messaging while reading. Computers & Education, 54(4), 927-931.

Jeong, S. H., & Hwang, Y. (2015). Multitasking and persuasion: The role of structural interference. Media Psychology, 18(4), 451-474.

Jeong, S. H., & Hwang, Y. (2016). Media multitasking effects on cognitive vs. attitudinal outcomes: A meta-analysis. Human Communication Research, 42(4), 599-618.

Lang, A., & Chrzan, J. (2015). Media Multitasking: Good, Bad, or Ugly? Annals of the International Communication Association, 39(1), 99–128. doi:10.1080/23808985.2015.11679173

Mark, G., Gudith, D., & Klocke, U. (2008). The cost of interrupted work: more speed and stress. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 107-110). ACM

Explain the learning material to someone else, then you are actively engaged with it. By explaining the learning material to someone else, you actively retrieve information. You think about the material again and then store it even better. In this way, you not only help your classmate but also yourself! For example, arrange with a classmate after a lesson or before a test to explain the material to each other. Supplement each other afterwards when there is missing material in the explanation.

Learning together, differentiating

Bowman-Perrott, L., Davis, H., Vannest, K., Williams, L., Greenwood, C., & Parker, R. (2013). Academic benefits of peer tutoring: A meta-analytic review of single-case research. School psychology review, 42(1), 39.

Cohen, P. A., Kulik, J. A., & Kulik, C. L. C. (1982). Educational outcomes of tutoring: A meta-analysis of findings. American educational research journal, 19(2), 237-248.

Galbraith, J., & Winterbottom, M. (2011). Peer‐tutoring: what’s in it for the tutor?. Educational Studies, 37(3), 321-332. https://doi.org/10.1080/03055698.2010.506330

Koh, A. W. L., Lee, S. C., & Lim, S. W. H. (2018). The learning benefits of teaching: A retrieval practice hypothesis. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 32(3), 401-410. https://doi.org/10.1002/acp.3410

By planning well, you work step by step towards a test or product, taking into account some facts about effective learning. For learning, it is important to set clear goals, review things regularly so you forget them less quickly, and take a break after 30 minutes of studying. It is most effective to learn a little bit every day. Additionally, it is useful to start after a fixed moment. For example: 'after dinner on Monday, then I will do my English homework.' This way, you can make the following schedule. If you have a test on March 20, then you want to review mainly on March 19, review and learn the last new things on March 18, review and learn a part on March 17, etc. Each day of studying then consists of reviewing the past few days and learning something new. It is also good to make practice questions in between, so you can see what you do or do not understand (and in a subject like Mathematics, you learn precisely by doing a lot of problems). A part of the example schedule:

Bjork, R. A., Dunlosky, J., & Kornell, N. (2013). Self-regulated learning: Beliefs, techniques, and illusions. Annual review of psychology, 64, 417-444.

Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D. T. (2013). Improving students’ learning with effective learning techniques: Promising directions from cognitive and educational psychology. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4-58.

Hartwig, M. K., & Dunlosky, J. (2012). Study strategies of college students: Are self-testing and scheduling related to achievement?. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 19(1), 126-134.

By exercising, your brain becomes more active, and more active brains ensure that you can process and store information better. So, it is a good idea to exercise for half an hour before you start learning. See it as a kind of warm-up. You can also alternate learning with active breaks. For example, take a short walk while calling your best friend or follow a warm-up routine from a YouTube video. It might be the most fun to see if you can combine learning with movement. For example, hang up a French word you need to learn and try to throw a ball at it. Write the translation on the other side to check if you got it right.

Best, J. R. (2010). Effects of physical activity on children’s executive function: Contributions of experimental research on aerobic exercise. Developmental Review, 30(4), 331-351.

Chang, Y. K., Labban, J. D., Gapin, J. I., & Etnier, J. L. (2012). The effects of acute exercise on cognitive performance: a meta-analysis. Brain research, 1453, 87-101. doi: 10.1016/j.brainres.2012.02.068

Fenesi, B., Lucibello, K., Kim, J. A., & Heisz, J. J. (2018). Sweat So You Don’t Forget: Exercise Breaks During a University Lecture Increase On-Task Attention and Learning. Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, 7(2), 261–269.doi:10.1016/j.jarmac.2018.01.012

Hillman, C.H., Pontifex, M.B., Raine, L.B., Castelli, D.M., Hall, E.E., Kramer, A.F. (2009). The effect of acute treadmill walking on cognitive control and academic achievement in preadolescent children. Neuroscience. 159(3):1044-54. doi:10.1016/j.neuroscience.2009.01.057

Lambourne, K., & Tomporowski, P. (2010). The effect of exercise-induced arousal on cognitive task performance: a meta-regression analysis. Brain research, 1341, 12-24.

By eating a varied and healthy diet and drinking enough, you can concentrate better and your memory will likely work better. Try to eat as many different (healthy) things as possible. Think about eating vegetables, fruits, nuts, and grains/bread. Also, try to drink about two liters per day. Be careful with soda and energy drinks: due to the large amount of sugars, they first provide an energy boost, but then your energy plummets, which can lead to a slump. The caffeine in coffee and energy drinks can help with taking a long test, but during studying, it can cause restlessness. Do not drink this either when you study in the evening: it will make you sleep less well, while you really need it.

Benton, D. (2011). Dehydration influences mood and cognition: a plausible hypothesis?. Nutrients, 3(5), 555-573

Edmonds, C. J., Crombie, R., Ballieux, H., Gardner, M. R., & Dawkins, L. (2013). Water consumption, not expectancies about water consumption, affects cognitive performance in adults. Appetite, 60, 148-153.

Fadda, R., Rapinett, G., Grathwohl, D., Parisi, M., Fanari, R., Calò, C. M., & Schmitt, J. (2012). Effects of drinking supplementary water at school on cognitive performance in children. Appetite, 59(3), 730-737.

Gómez-Pinilla, F. (2008). Brain foods: the effects of nutrients on brain function. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 9(7), 568.

Psaltopoulou, T., Sergentanis, T. N., Panagiotakos, D. B., Sergentanis, I. N., Kosti, R., & Scarmeas, N. (2013). Mediterranean diet, stroke, cognitive impairment, and depression: a meta‐analysis. Annals of neurology, 74(4), 580-591.

Place your mobile at a distance where you cannot see or hear it. Smartphones are designed to attract your attention, among other things with the help of notifications. This greatly disrupts learning because to learn well you need your full attention. The further away the mobile phone is, the better you can learn. Because you have no distractions (or think you will have none), you are much better concentrated (see image). Just looking at the mobile phone takes you out of your concentration for an average of 2 minutes. So, for example, leave it downstairs in the kitchen while you study in your room upstairs, or put your smartphone on airplane mode so you no longer receive notifications.

Beland, L. P., & Murphy, R. (2016). Ill communication: technology, distraction & student performance. Labour Economics, 41, 61-76.

Chen, Q., & Yan, Z. (2016). Does multitasking with mobile phones affect learning? A review. Computers in Human Behavior, 54, 34-42.

Felisoni, D. D., & Godoi, A. S. (2018). Cell phone usage and academic performance: An experiment. Computers & Education, 117,175-187.

Thornton, B., Faires, A., Robbins, M., & Rollins, E. (2014). The mere presence of a cell phone may be distracting. Social Psychology.

Ward, A. F., Duke, K., Gneezy, A., & Bos, M. W. (2017). Brain drain: The mere presence of one’s own smartphone reduces available cognitive capacity. Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, 2, 140-154

By sleeping enough hours, you can remember things better. Short learning sessions and enough sleep are often more effective than long learning sessions and little sleep. Your brain uses sleep to process and store newly learned information in your long-term memory. Furthermore, sleep ensures that you have more energy and less stress. It also helps you think better. In short, you need enough sleep to learn well and perform well on tests, for example. You need an average of eight hours of sleep per night. A few tips to sleep as well as possible: • Try to go to sleep and wake up at the same times • Drink as little coffee, energy drinks, and other caffeine-containing beverages as possible • Do not use the snooze function: snoozing wakes you up repeatedly from your sleep. As a result, you do not wake up refreshed and are less productive for the rest of the day. • Do not watch movies before going to sleep that trigger adrenaline • Place your phone far away from your bed • If you worry before sleeping, write down your thoughts and address them the next day

Arora, T., Broglia, E., Thomas, G. N., & Taheri, S. (2014). Associations between specific technologies and adolescent sleep quantity, sleep quality, and parasomnias. Sleep medicine, 15(2), 240-247.

Astill, R. G., Van der Heijden, K. B., Van IJzendoorn, M. H., & Van Someren, E. J. (2012). Sleep, cognition, and behavioral problems in school-age children: A century of research meta-analyzed. Psychological bulletin, 138(6), 1109.

Backhaus, J., Hoeckesfeld, R., Born, J., Hohagen, F., & Junghanns, K. (2008). Immediate as well as delayed post learning sleep but not wakefulness enhances declarative memory consolidation in children. Neurobiology of learning and memory, 89(1), 76-80.

Dewald, J. F., Meijer, A. M., Oort, F. J., Kerkhof, G. A., & Bögels, S. M. (2010). The influence of sleep quality, sleep duration and sleepiness on school performance in children and adolescents: A meta-analytic review. Sleep medicine reviews, 14(3), 179-189.

Matricciani, L., Bin, Y. S., Lallukka, T., Kronholm, E., Dumuid, D., Paquet, C., & Olds, T. (2017). Past, present, and future: trends in sleep duration and implications for public health. Sleep health, 3(5), 317-323.

Study for a maximum of 25 minutes and then take a 5-minute break. The ideal study time (and break time) does not exist: it depends on the person and what is being learned. However, it is often the case that we can only concentrate on something for a maximum of 25 minutes. Your brain needs time to process everything and can only handle a limited amount of new information (see cognitive load theory). A short break helps to get back to work refreshed. Studying for hours on end is not very effective. One way to do this is the Pomodoro technique.

Ariga, A., & Lleras, A. (2011). Brief and rare mental “breaks” keep you focused: Deactivation and reactivation of task goals preempt vigilance decrements. Cognition, 118(3), 1873-7383. doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2010.12.007

http://www.studietips.leidenuniv.nl/concendo.html

Make use of memory aids. Memory aids, such as mnemonics, help you remember information better. They work because you link new information to knowledge that is already stored in your memory. Often you remember them better if you come up with them yourself, but there are also already good well-known mnemonics. These are, for example, 't kofschip (to know if a word ends with a d or t) or the TV-TAS (all the Wadden Islands). Ask your teacher about it. Did you know that you can find a whole bunch of well-known mnemonics at https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ezelsbruggetje? Two other types of memory aids that have proven to work well in research are: 1. Method of loci ('the memory palace'): the idea that you imagine a route or room that you know very well. Then you link the information you need to remember to certain places or objects you encounter along the way. The Method of Loci is especially effective for learning facts and words (see image (Dresler, et al., 2017)). 2. Keyword method: with this method, you create a mental image of a word or a related word. This is effective because visualizing something helps with remembering it. When words are difficult to visualize, such as religion, it can help to think of something that is easy to visualize and has an association with the word to be learned, such as church in this case. This method is especially useful when you need to learn words from another language.

Active repetition

Amiryousefi, M., & Ketabi, S. (2011). Mnemonic instruction: A way to boost vocabulary learning and recall. Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 2(1), 178.

Campos, A., Amor, A., & González, M. A. (2004). The importance of the keyword-generation method in keyword mnemonics. Experimental Psychology, 51(2), 125-131.

Dresler, M., Shirer, W. R., Konrad, B. N., Müller, N. C. J., Wagner, I. C., Fernández, G., Greicius, M. D. (2017). Mnemonic Training Reshapes Brain Networks to Support Superior Memory. Neuron, 93(5), 1227–1235.e6. doi:10.1016/j.neuron.2017.02.003

Legge, E. L., Madan, C. R., Ng, E. T., & Caplan, J. B. (2012). Building a memory palace in minutes: Equivalent memory performance using virtual versus conventional environments with the Method of Loci. Acta psychologica, 141(3), 380-390.

McCabe, J. A. (2015). Location, location, location! Demonstrating the mnemonic benefit of the method of loci. Teaching of Psychology, 42(2), 169-173.

Ask yourself questions about the learning material. Reading the learning material and asking yourself questions about it is one of the best ways to learn. By regularly repeating the learning material, you forget it less quickly: your brain has to actively retrieve the information from your memory, which helps you remember it better. A good way to do this is, for example, using flashcards, creating your own test questions and answering them, or making your own quiz on a site or app.

Activating prior knowledge,

Agarwal, P. K., Karpicke, J. D., Kang, S. H., Roediger III, H. L., & McDermott, K. B. (2008). Examining the testing effect with open‐and closed‐book tests. Applied Cognitive Psychology: The Official Journal of the Society for Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, 22(7), 861-876.

Carpenter, S. K., Pashler, H., Wixted, J. T., & Vul, E. (2008). The effects of tests on learning and forgetting. Memory & Cognition, 36(2), 438-448.

Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D. T. (2013). Improving students’ learning with effective learning techniques: Promising directions from cognitive and educational psychology. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4-58.

Roediger, H. L., Putnam, A. L., & Smith, M. A. (2011). Ten benefits of testing and their applications to educational practice. In J. Mestre & B. Ross (Eds.), Psychology of learning and motivation: Cognition in education, (pp. 1-36). Oxford: Elsevier.

Reading a text once is useful, the second time it just seems so. When you read something for the first time, you extract new information from it. When you reread a text, you recognize it. Because you recognize the text, you think you know it by heart. However, recognizing a text is not the same as truly knowing it by heart and, for example, being able to answer questions about it. Because you recognize the text, you think less deeply about it, which means you also learn less. In this way, your brain is actually fooling you. What works much better is to write down from memory what you remember after some time (and then look up what you don't remember), answer questions about the text, or create a diagram of the learning material. In this way, you learn more actively.

Adesope, O. O., Trevisan, D. A., & Sundararajan, N. (2017). Rethinking the use of tests: A meta-analysis of practice testing. Review of Educational Research, 87(3), 659-701.

Callender, A. A., & McDaniel, M. A. (2009). The limited benefits of rereading educational texts. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 34(1), 30-41

Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D. T. (2013). Improving students’ learning with effective learning techniques: Promising directions from cognitive and educational psychology. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4-58.

Rawson, K. A. (2012). Why do rereading lag effects depend on test delay?. Journal of Memory and Language, 66(4), 870-884.